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Researcher Jeff Levin, Ph.D., author of God, Faith, and Health, is recognized as one of the leading researchers in spirituality and health. As a first-year graduate student in the School of Public Health at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, Levin became intrigued by two articles that found a surprising and significant connection between spirituality and heart disease, a connection that remains one of the best-researched areas of the positive effects of religious behavior on health. His curiosity led to an in-depth evaluation and pioneering research on the impact of religious practices on disease. In God, Faith, and Health, Dr. Levin notes that there are more than 50 studies in which religious practices were found to be protective against cardiovascular disease, including death due to heart attacks and strokes as well as against numerous risk factors such as high blood pressure and elevated cholesterol and triglyceride levels. In particular, Dr. Levin highlights the strong inverse correlation between strong religious commitment and blood pressure that was evident no matter what religion an individual chose to practice or his or her geographical location or ancestry.

Transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI), also known as transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR), involves a puncture though the skin into the blood vessels in the groin. It is similar to the approach that is used for a cardiac catheterization of the coronary arteries. The procedure can also be done by making a small incision near the fourth rib.

Candidates for this percutaneous procedure include patients with severe symptomatic aortic stenosis and are deemed inoperable by a surgeon. Inoperability has no single definition but most commonly it is defined as a patient who faces more than a 50% risk of death or severe morbidity following a standard, surgical aortic valve replacement. Candidates typically have one or more of the following characteristics: advanced age, previous heart surgery, severe COPD, severe diabetes, home oxygen dependence, pulmonary hypertension, previous radiation to the chest, a severely calcified aorta (AKA a porcelain aorta) and/or extreme frailty.

The New England Journal of Medicine recently reported that, in patients with severe symptomatic aortic stenosis who are not candidates for surgery, TAVI (aka TAVR) is associated significantly improved survival, improved symptoms, and improved quality of life compared to standard treatment.

An aortic dissection -- a tear that creates a separation of the layers of the aorta, which carries blood to the body -- is considered acute within two weeks of its presentation. Often, it is complicated by rupture or risk of rupture, or obstruction of blood flow to one or more parts of the body, and requires emergency intervention.